Pazardzhik (Bulgarian: Пазарджик [ˈpazɐrd͡ʒik]) is a city situated along the banks of the Maritsa river, southern Bulgaria. It is the centre of Pazardzhik Province and Pazardzhik Municipality. It is located in the Upper Thracian Plain and in the Pazardzhik-Plovdiv Field, a subregion of the plains. It is west of Plovdiv, about 37 kilometres (23 mi), 112 kilometres (70 mi) southeast of Sofia and 288 kilometres (179 mi) from Burgas. The population is 55,220, as it has been growing around from the end of the 19th century to the end of the 20th century. The city reached its highest milestone, exceeding 80,000. Due to poor economic performance in Bulgaria during the 1990s and early 2000s, emigration of Bulgarians began, which affected Pazardzhik as well.
The history of Pazardzhik can be traced back to the 7th millennium BC, with early civilisations being brought from Asia-Minor. They were agro-pastralists and settled near Maritsa, Pazardzhik and Sinitovo. A clay idol named the Pazardzhik Venus was found in 1872. The Drougoubitai tribe settled in the early Middle Ages. Many different researches have all been disputed on the founding of Pazardzhik. One of them was that the city was founded in 1395 by nomads from Saruhan. Another one was three years later in 1398, the city was founded by the migration of Tatars from Actav to Rumelia. The third is about the establishment in 1418, where the Minnet Bey and the Tatars came from Isquilip, and the fourth thesis and the final one is the city's foundation from the resettled Crimean Tatar people. Rice cultivation intensified in the region, which made the economy of the city grow.
During the Russo-Turkish War (1806–1812), there was a brief siege under Count Nikolay Kamensky. In the mid-19th century, it was an important craft and trade centre. Many institutions were established in this period. Тhe Church of the Dormition was first founded. Vasil Levski appointed the revolutionary committee in Pazardzhik as a second centre in 1872. Following 4 years after that, Georgi Benkovski resumed the activity of the committee. During the Russo-Turkish War (1877–1878), Iosif Gurko wrestled the Ottomans out of the city and during the same period, Ovanes Sovadzhian prevented the annihilation of the city. The first reported Red Army troops entered Pazardzhik on 23 September 1944. After 9 September 1944, the city grew to an industrial centre, which in 1947 during nationalisation, began consolidation of industrial enterprises. There were demonstrations consisting of about 5,000 protesters, demanding to change to democracy.
The economy of Pazardzhik is now a slowly growing one. GDP per capita is 9,101 BGN in 2012. The average monthly salary was 635 BGN and unemployment was 5.2% in 2015. The economy today is mainly based on agriculture, which also includes animal breeding. Farms are mainly located in the fertile land of the Upper Thracian Plain. The landmarks of the city are the clock tower, Church of the Dormition, which has a wood-carved iconstasis protected by UNESCO, the History Museum, the old post office, the Drama Theatre and others.
Geography
Vegetation
The vegetation in and around the town is mainly broad-leaved species - oak, linden, poplar, chestnut, plane and less often coniferous species - mainly pine and fir. Willow, birch, ivy grow around the rivers.
The region is traditionally used for agriculture due to the favourable climate and fertile soils and is considered a recognised region for the cultivation of vegetables and fruit. Besides cereals, tomatoes, peppers, potatoes, watermelons, tobacco and wine, but also peaches, cherries and cotton are grown.
From the 15th century until the 1980s, Pazardzhik was a centre of Bulgarian rice cultivation, which was practised in the humid lowlands of the Upper Thracian Plain. The yellowish rice grains of Pazardzhik were well known and better appreciated than the rice grown around Plovdiv or further southeast along the Maritsa. Western visitors were amazed by the intensive rice culture and already in the 18th century spoke of the area as a "European Egypt" (in a travel diary from 1786.) Today, rice cultivation no longer plays a major role in the Pazardzhik region. After 1989, production was stopped or even abandoned (in most places) within a few years, as Bulgarian rice was no longer competitive on the world market.
Climate
Pazardzhik has a humid subtropical climate (Cfa) according to the Köppen climate classification and a considerable amount of humid continental climate and Mediterranean influence on the city. According to Batakliev's book about the region, the highest temperature ever recorded around 1921–1955 is 40.6 °C (105.1 °F) in July, while the lowest is −29.5 °C (−21.1 °F) in February. Mainly in June, July and August are shown to have higher temperatures in comparison with the other months. The coldest months are December, January and February, as shown in the climate table. The wettest months of the year are May and June, both above 58 mm.
Etymology
The name Pazardzhik derives from Ottoman Turkish: پازارجق, romanized: Pazarcık (in Turkish: Pazarcık), literally meaning a "small market." Called Tatar Pazardzhik because the Qarā Tātārs settled there earlier in the town's history, its title thus signified, "small Tatar market". From the 15th-19th century, foreign travellers wrote the city's name as Pazardzhik, Bazardzhik, Tatar Pazardzhik, etc. Bulgarian written documents from the 19th century preferred Pazardzhik. It was also nicknamed The City of Rice before the Liberation. After 1934, the city changed its name officially to Pazardzhik.
Pazardzhik Point on Snow Island in the South Shetland Islands, Antarctica is named after Pazardzhik.
History
Antiquity
The beginning of the pattern of civilisation brought by the Asia-Minor settlers in the second half of the 7th millennium BC has so far been judged on the basis of the early Neolithic finds from the Rakitovo settlement mound, which chronologically corresponds to the Karanovo I culture. The first known and discovered tribes in the city was in the Stone Age period, around the same time. They were agro-pastralists and founded a settlement from this era at the right shores of Maritsa, near Sinitovo and Pazardzhik. It continues until the 5th millennium BC during Chalcolithic period in the south, near the Besaparian hills. Another settlement was established in this period, at the today's railway station. It was destroyed due to the construction of the railroad Baronhirshova in 1876, the station and other structures around it in the beginning of the 20th century. A clay idol (named the Pazardzhik Venus) was found in 1872 and now is in the Natural History Museum in Vienna. It was made in the 5th millennium BC and is a clay figure of a seated woman. Near the city lived the Bessi tribe in the Iron Age, which their main city was Bessapara near the village Sinitovo and the ancient Roman road Via Militaris passed through it. Until 1920, was preserved a Thracian tombstone near the today's market in Pazardzhik. Northeast of it, an annular well was discovered, believed to be from an Thracian villa complex.
The Eneolithic culture is best represented by the layers of the Yunatsite settlement mound - its last period corresponds to the Karanovo VI culture. The development of the Late Neolithic culture was interrupted in the first centuries of the 4th millennium BC. - In the period from 3700 to 3300 BC, life in the settlement mounds ended. However, some finds from the mountain areas of the Rhodopes and Sredna Gora show that there was no 'hiatus' (interruption) between the Eneolithic and Early Bronze Age cultures, indicating that at least part of the lowland population of Pazardzhik seems to have retreated to the mountains.
Middle Ages
The Drougoubitai tribe settled here in the early Middle Ages. The region is incorporated in the First Bulgarian Empire during Omurtag's reign and also the battles of Malamir. Archaeological leads from the Second Bulgarian Empire were founded near the west of the city. In the left shores of Topolnitsa, fragments of sgraffito ceramics, iron shovel and sword were founded in 1926.
Disputes were made on when the city was established. According to research made by historian Stefan Zahariev concluded that Pazardzhik was first founded in 1395, where nomads from Saruhan settled under Bayezid I's orders. First and only, Zahariev implicates the nomads of Sarukhan in the founding of Pazardzhik. To answer the question of how and when the city was founded, Zahariev combines two different episodes in the history of the settlement of Thrace to create a 'story'. Three years later in 1398, according to the history of İbn-i Kemal, the city was founded by the migration of Tatars from Actav to Rumelia. Another claim according to Joseph von Hammer-Purgstall, an Austrian historian and orientalist, is about the establishment is during 1418, where the Minnet Bey and the Tatars from Isquilip, which resettled due to Mehmed I. Mehmed, after taking Samsun, passed through Isquilip and takes punitive measures against Minnet Bey. The reason for this, although presented by Aşıkpaşazadeh in the form of a dialogue, is explicitly stated in the source - Minnet Bey deviated from the campaign to which he had been called. The entire group of Tatars was taken to Rumelia and settled in Konush, where Minnetoglu Mehmed Bey built an imaret and a caravanserai and enlivened the surrounding area. Some facts in the narrative require special attention. According to the contrast of Balkanski, the resettled Tatars belonged to the Samagar tribe and Minnetoglu Bey is portrayed as the executor of the Sultan's will. The leader of the deported Tatars was Minnet Bey and they most likely appeared as part of Timur's forces in the Isquilip region, a fact reported only by the "anonymous". The identity of Minnet Bey has not been fully clarified in historiography. The fourth claim and the preferred one is the city's establishment from the resettled Crimean Tatar people by the Ottoman Sultan Bayezid II's campaign on Kiliia and Akkerman according to the Dutch professor Machiel Kiel. The Tatars settled there in 1485, where the local villages held an annual market and their leadership was entrusted to their leader Sar-Khan Bey, who in turn settled in the depopulated village of Zagorovo, from which Sarukhanbehlu (today Septemvri) emerged. According to Zahariev, a historian from Pazardzhik, the first Tatar settlers were united in the mahalla Hadzha Kalach, which also built the first mosque in the town. It became a town in 1488.
Pazardzhik developed in the years from its foundation in 1398 to the time of the earliest Ottoman register available in 1472. According to the register, by the year it was put together, the town had roughly 105 Muslim homes and was a completely Muslim town. Within a period of less than eighty years, Tatar Pazardzhik was already included as a town in the Ottoman cadastre - eloquent testimony to its highly successful development. It is safe to assume that only a few years after its foundation, Pazardzhik, like a number of other settlements in Thrace, was severely shaken by the civil war between the Ottoman sons of Sultan Bayezid I. In the 1530s, an intensification of rice cultivation began in Thrace, directly affecting the immediate vicinity of Pazardzhik. According to the accounts of Hoca Sadeddin Efendi, in this case taken directly from Idris Bitlisi, rice cultivation was introduced in the region as early as the time of Lala Şahin Pasha, but according to the authoritative opinion of Inaljik, the intensification and expansion of rice cultivation in the Plovdiv region can only take place during the reign of Mehmed II. This is confirmed by the reports of the construction of the city of Plovdiv by Hadım Şehabeddin until the mid-15th century.
Early Modern
A part of the Tatars left Pazardzhik and its surroundings and those who remained in the city turned their backs completely on nomadism and turned to agriculture or handicrafts - a fact reported by Ibn Kemal, who probably described the situation as he knew it in the 1580s. Within a few decades these changes breathed vital force into the new settlement, and in the second half of the 16th century the first mosque was built, attracting settlers and craftsmen, and the village took on the characteristic features of a kasbah of the time. Unlike neighbouring Philibe (Plovdiv), whose urban planning depended entirely on the sultan and local senior administrators, Pazardzhik attracted the attention and active support of influential Akıncı families. Among the builders of public buildings in the city are the names of Evrenosoglu, who promoted the construction of the city's imaret, the influential Malkoçoğlu Bali Bey, who built the Pirzade Curve near Pazardzhik, to Kadı Ishak Çelebi from Bitola, who built one of the city's mosques. The influence of nearby Ihtiman, completely dominated by the powerful Akinji clan of Mihalovtsi, is also important. In the 17th and 18th centuries, the town flourished as a port and warehouse on the river Maritsa, storing grain, wine, rice and timber from the Rhodope Mountains, as well as storing iron from Samokov. The river was used as a water route for transporting goods on rafts to Adrianople and Constantinople.
In 1718 Gerard Kornelius Drish visited Pazardzhik and wrote "the buildings here according to construction, size and beauty stand higher than those of Niš, Sofia and all other places". In 1738 the population of Pazardzhik was predominantly Turkish. On 2 June 1810, Count Nikolay Kamensky invaded the town with 14,000 soldiers, 4,300 cavalry, and around 160 guns (12 foot batteries and 2 horse batteries). The town was seized after a brief siege and a tremendous attack, for which Kamensky's regiment received the silver Bazardzhik (Pazardzhik) medal, which was worn on St. George ribbons.